Once he got home, he first opened the door at the back of the house. Then he ran to the front room, through a narrow and long corridor, finally entering, where it was light. He opened the window, which led to the inside garden, and climbed out feeling relieved. He stayed in the garden all day, always having the feeling of being watched from the inside. He was scared and he held his breath to listen at times, while ussually spending his hours, in either rain, snow or sunshine, with inventing fairytales and stories, in which he himself would then play different parts and characters. These stories were of heroism, with ghosts and monsters to be fought, loved ones to be saved and the sublime tragic of the mo-ment to be acted out. Sometimes, there was real tragedy and he often made himself sad by following a storyline which had a bad ending. On one occasion, he remembers, he had fought his way through opposing armies to save someone or something worth saving, and was wounded but brave, and kept moving on, but only to find his beloved killed by the enemy, an enemy that had such little dignity in accepting their defeat that, as in Greek mythology, it had to perform an act of such ven-gence and brutality, that it would leave everyone broken forever. He used to commit suicide then, realizing there was nothing left to live for. With that little wooden sword sticking out of my body I lay for minutes, quietly, on the cold concrete.

And he remembered an occasion in which, terrified by the fear of fear itself, he climbed back into the house and dialed his father’s number on the telephone. His father was with another woman and did not want to come for him, no matter how much he begged or pleaded. After a while, the elder asked him why it was that he should come over. But by this time he was too proud to answer anymore and he had already decided to take his chances with the house alone. And even after those times had passed, he had often remembered himself in that moment.